Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is taking a page from his friend FLG and tell you all a few of the songs he just got dished out on his little black iPod. He is about to sign off for the evening and go to the Capitals game tonight with Villainette #2. If you happen to be in that area of town keep an eye out for him.

(Your Maximum Leader also likes Summertime by The Sundays - but you can’t embed that video. Clicky this linky to view.)

Whenever your Maximum Leader hears this Dino song he mentally thanks his friend Eric for turning him on to his little ditty.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees on the news wire that President Obama gave Queen Elizabeth an iPod as a gift upon meeting her yesterday.

Now your Maximum Leader will not hammer the President for this gift like other conservative commentators have. It was a shiny new iPod. It was probably one of those G6 ones with a gazillion GB of storage. One reads that it was loaded with photos and video of the Queen’s 2007 visit to the US and photos and video of the President’s inauguration address. It also had show tunes pre-loaded. According to the article there were songs from “Camelot” and “My Fair Lady.” One hopes that there was also some Gilbert and Sullivan. Your Maximum Leader wonders if there was any British patriotic music pre-loaded for Her Majesty. You know, something cool like the Sex Pistols’ interpretation of “God Save the Queen.” (If you’d like to hear the song you can click here for a video. It wouldn’t embed correctly here… Sorry.)

Of course, this is Her Majesty’s second iPod. Your Maximum Leader seems to remember reading somewhere that Princes William and Harry got their Grandmum an iPod a few years ago.

One suspects that Her Majesty’s second iPod will wind up on eBay in a few days…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is reminded about two bourbon related items in his memory due to a comment by John S attached to the recent (lengthy) post called “The Quest for Ham.” John S. relates that bourbon is a good liquid accompaniment to a meal including country ham. Your Maximum Leader quite agrees. Indeed, bourbon is a great accompaniment to many meals.

But this talk of bourbon caused your Maximum Leader to remember two bourbon related items (as he was saying). Here is the first…

Your Maximum Leader grew up in Alexandria, VA. (Well, technically Fairfax County, VA - but the mailing address was Alexandria.) And while that is Virginia, he later learned that Northern Virginia was viewed by those residing in areas south of Fairfax County believed there was more “North” in that region than “Virginia.” In some respects that is true, but in a great many it is not. Well. Upon moving to a more southern part of the Commonwealth to attend college and work he learned a great many things. One of these things was what the hell “bourbon and branch water” was.

While at college your Maximum Leader had the occasion to meet a great many interesting folks who could have been characters out of a Faulkner novel. (This was made ironically funny by the fact that some of these characters had met/studied under/gotten drunk with Faulkner hissownself while the latter was teaching at UVA.) One time while at the home of one of these characters with a few other characters it came time to make drinks. (Indeed, time to make drinks was generally right after exchanging greetings and before sitting down on the porch.) One genteel older lady asked for a “bourbon and branch water.” Your Maximum Leader was probably 18 at the time at this was the first time he’d ever heard someone ask for bourbon and branch water. As the evening went on, and the drinks continued to flow (your Maximum Leader was drinking cheap Scotch with lots of ice and water) he finally got up the courage to ask what exactly was this “branch water” that people would mix with their bourbon? Well… Let us just say that these good people knew when was the appropriate time to pull wool over a young babe’s eyes. And that was the time. Your Maximum Leader was then subjected to a 35 minute dissertation by two older gentlemen about what actually constituted “branch water.” One declaimed that the only true branch water was that collected from the dripping dew off hardwood trees in the spring and fall when the dew points were sufficiently low. The other declaimed that in fact branch water could be the dew collected off of any species of tree or large bush. Given the passion (and length of discourse) between these two men about what was branch water, your Maximum Leader went on for about a week believing that in fact branch water was collected from dew off trees and bushes.

Okay… Your Maximum Leader was a bit drunk at the time and in retrospect should have inquired further about the actual means of production to get details… Alas, questions concerning the collection, bottling and distribution of branch water didn’t occur to a drunken Maximum Leader. Your Maximum Leader was accidentially disabused of this deception when another old southern gentleman explained that he had a lovely little “branch” flowing from a spring on his property. When pressed to explain the etymology of “branch” in this context your Maximum Leader learned that “branch water” is in fact water from a small clear stream (often fed by a spring).

There is story number one. Story number two…

Well not so much a story as a comment. A number of years ago a good friend sent to your Maximum Leader an e-mail containing the transcript of a letter written to West Point Commandant General William Connor from Col. Simon B. Buckner, Jr. containing the Buckner family recipe for a mint julep. If you’ve not read this you probably ought to. Here is a link to the whole affair - including the set-up. If you are interested in the most famous part of the exchange (Buckner’s letter to Connor) that link is right here.

Your Maximum Leader’s friend added some acid commentary to the over-flowery nature of Buckner’s letter to Connor and how no matter how you dress it up the drink is just sugar water, bourbon, ice and mint. Many years ago your Maximum Leader agreed with the assessment of Buckner’s description being over the top. But now, years later, it doesn’t seem so over-done at all. Indeed, like the hams your Maximum Leader wrote so fondly of just a few days ago; sometimes doing something the old fashioned way is pretty damned good. Your Maximum Leader thinks that he’ll seek out a branch flowing from a clean cool spring and make himself some juleps to go with his ham on Easter…

Carry on.

Update from your Maxmium Leader: Greetings, readers of that well known public intellectual R.S. McCain. Thanks for visiting. Your Maximum Leader hopes you stick around and check out other posts. Of course, if you are looking for bourbon and boobs he is happy to acquiesce to your requests. Bourbon post is above (as you surely know) and the boobs come to you from the co-star of “My Name is Bruce” Grace Thorsen.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader laughed aloud today when he heard an update from the ongoing G20 summit. Later he laughed again when he read this off the AP news wire:

[British PM Gordon] Brown initially trumpeted the gathering as “a new Bretton Woods — a new financial architecture for the years ahead.” But the meeting so far bears little similarity to the 1944 New Hampshire conference where the eventual winners of World War II gathered to set postwar global monetary and financial order.

Washington has eased off on its push for other governments to pump more money into economic stimulus programs after heavy opposition from European countries, who contend their bigger social safety nets make more spending unnecessary.

Germany and France have instead campaigned for tougher rules to restrain financial market excesses.

That disagreement has lowered expectations for the London summit and weakened confidence in the world’s ability to quickly pull out of the downturn.

The boldface emphasis is that of your Maximum Leader and not the AP.

Gordon Brown was going around touting the G20 summit as a new Bretton Woods and now lowering expectations…

It caused your Maximum Leader to recall a portion of a comedy routine by Eddie Izzard in his “Dress to Kill” show. Izzard recounts an exchange between himself and his career counsellor in school. It goes like this:

Izzard: “I want to be an astronaut, discover new things.”
He (the counsellor) said, “Look, you’re British, so scale it down a bit.”
“All right, I want to work in a shoe shop, then. Discover shoes that no one’s ever discovered in the back of the shop.”
He said: “Look, you’re British, so scale it down a bit.”
“All right, I want to work in a sewer, then. And discover sewage no one’s ever discovered and pile it on my head and sell myself to an art gallery.”

Lowering expectations for the G20 summit caused your Maximum Leader to picture Gordon Brown going into a sewer, piling newly discovered sewage on his head and trying to sell himself to the Tate Modern.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader wonders if you all had forgotten about the Minnesota Senate race. It still hasn’t been fully resolved. Yup. April 1 and no resolution.

Well… It looks like that is about to change. According to a piece in the Star-Tribune (that is linked through the Boston Herald) Norm Coleman’s attorneys are, while not throwing in the towel, admitting that they have probably lost the appeals.

According to the piece:

Norm Coleman’s lawyers all but conceded defeat in Minnesota’s U.S. Senate race Tuesday and promised to appeal after a panel of three judges ordered no more than 400 new absentee ballots opened and counted, far fewer than the Republican had sought in his effort to overcome a lead held by Democrat Al Franken.

The ballots include many that Franken had identified as wrongly rejected as well as ballots that Coleman wanted opened in his quest to overcome the 225-vote lead that Franken gained after a recount.

“We are very pleased,” said Franken lead lawyer Marc Elias shortly after the ruling, which calls for ballots to be opened next week.
Coleman legal spokesman Ben Ginsberg acknowledged that the Republican may have lost the seven-week trial and was prepared to appeal to the Minnesota Supreme Court.

“It is pretty much of a long shot with that few ballots being put in play,” Ginsberg said, comparing the Republican’s odds of winning the trial to someone betting on the winning team in the NCAA basketball tournament. “We are disappointed. But we feel the court is wrong and we will appeal.”

The ruling is not a final order and it’s not clear for which candidate the ballots were cast. About half of them came from Hennepin, Ramsey and St. Louis Counties, which went heavily for Franken in the election. But about 60 percent of the 400 ballots are from Republican-leaning suburbs of Hennepin County or counties that broke for Coleman.

Wow. Your Maximum Leader can hardly imagine the pride he will feel in his government knowing that a former Saturday Night Live writer/cast member and 3rd rate political commentator will be a member of the United States Senate. You know, before too long the names long remembered from that august body will read: Clay, Webster, Calhoun, LaFollette, Lodge, Dirksen, Jackson, Moynihan, Helms and Smalley/Franken.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader needs to ask you all to ponder some eternal questions… Here they are…

Who trims the all fat off a corned beef? Really. Who? It isn’t the best part - but it is a damned good part. (Well… Mrs Villain does. She also cuts the corned beef with the grain - which makes no sense. This is why your Maximum Leader tries to keep all meat carving duties to himself.)

Would a hand-job from Kali be really great, or too much?

If your “tween” children start doing chores around the house (like laundry and dusting) without being asked, cajoled or prodded should you just give thanks or start being suspicious about what they might want in return?

What the hell do all these people who protest every time there is a big international summit actually DO when there isn’t a summit going on? If they are anti-capitalists and anti-bank and anti-fossil fuel and pretty much anti-civilization why don’t they just live in a hut in the woods way off the grid and stay there? Did they drive to the protest in their own car? Idiots.

Speaking of corned beef… Why don’t people eat more corned beef? Your Maximum Leader normally has one around St Patricks Day. But then after St Patricks Day he checks out all the grocery stores around until he finds the one really selling them for cheap. Then he buys 4 or 5 to have throughout the spring. It takes stores a while to sell out of corned beef. He doesn’t understand that.

What possesses a person to get a tramp stamp? You can’t see it yourself? Out of sight out of mind? Is it there to provide someone with a little extra visual stimulation while they are sodomizing you? Your Maximum Leader also doesn’t understand those “angel wing tattoos” on shoulder blades. Frankly, he doesn’t understand tattoos.

There you are. Discuss among yourselves.

Carry on.